Mike Cobley

Virginia And The Elements

She was to be found in the schoolyard that connected the village to the church. A bitter throughway in the most unforgiving of seasons. Her view was of hills and fields, and her mind far from the hustle and bustle of busy village life. Her purpose was words. She needed to find a way out of the tunnel, that dark expanse that clouded her judgement, knocked her confidence, and gave way to damaging thoughts she knew she was almost certain never to entertain.

The school was closed for the Christmas holiday. She liked the peace. No prying eyes and dominating babble, just the indecipherable tune of the wind whistling its way. She tried to take the pulse of the chill and drum a rhythm of words into meaningful sentences. Be at one with nature. Something started to flow. She moved on.

Her writing room was a lodge. A wood and glass hut at the end of her garden that backed on to the school yard and overlooked the church grounds. The scream of youth and the wail of death. All of life but, at present, none of its signs. She took up the solitary pen and wrote. Word after word. A torrent to match the soon to open heavy skies. She was lost in her creativity. Briefly an ageless woman from no fixed abode.

She snapped out of the trance when the heavens opened. She watched rain droplets race from roof to gutter; then onto the home straight and running down the glass of the lodge's window. She could sit for hours on a bleak December afternoon watching droplet after droplet take to the track and wind its way to the bottom and out of sight. The muse had flown once more.

The next day started bright and crisp. The stars seemed to be in alignment. Today she would write. Indeed, it was written in the stars that days like these were for solitude and progress.

She was calm. The bath water let its steam warm her soul. Perhaps the worst of winter had passed. Maybe these days of increasing length would expand her creative horizons.

Breakfast was taken with the low drone of a radio. News was, she believed, always bad. It took the edge off her day. She set the volume so she could hear the voices but not the words. Made it seem that people were in the room. Voices would comfort her. They added to the symmetry that the early morning sun had already brought to her wellbeing.

She stepped out into the light. The dark beams of her cottage gave way to the boundless optimism of a new day. Today she would write. Today her perceived limp and languid story would soar and strike a chord with all. She wound her way through the village, avoiding eye contact and remaining cunningly oblivious to the everyday chatter of country folk.

Once sat at her desk in front of her work, she glanced out at the church. A family of visitors were staring back at her. For that brief moment she felt little more than an exhibit in a cage. Her muscles tensed. She noted the skies darkening once more. The family took themselves into the church in search of shelter. The elements had come to her rescue once again.

How she loved loved this place in winter. The season was not an arbitrator, but a knife. It cut, if she was lucky, the chord of community for three or more long months. It emptied the streets, hurried along conversations, moved prophets from mountains to their homes. It gave her companionship in silence. A holy isolation.

Her horizon was people free once more. The day was still young. She wrote furiously and with talent. She silently applauded her craft. Until ....

There outside her lodge and sat silently with back to her, was an elfin figure. Female. Alone. Of indistinguishable age and looks. Who the hell was she? Why was she there? Startled and anxious the authoress sat frozen. Unsure of action and with pulse racing, she stood to get a better look at the mysterious intruder .. but she was gone. The dew upon which she had sat was untouched. There was no record of her trespass. No clues to her identity. The day of writing was to be lost.

She hurried to her bedroom, closed the blinds, took to her bed and drifted on the theme of the strange young woman who'd disrupted her flow and turned the tide of her focus. There was something comforting in the curves and outline of the young female form she'd witnessed. She must be found.

Covers off, shoes on, out into the crisp midday sunshine and into the neighbouring Church of St Peter; glancing up in awe at the small Norman window on the north side of the chancel. She felt a presence behind her. Turning, she briefly saw the smiling figure of the mysterious woman seen so hurriedly the previous day. She was a vision of beauty.

The authoress felt her heart thaw. Felt the surrender of her soul. Loneliness was a beast that had been slaughtered. She ran towards the figure but as she approached it faded into nothingness, and the coolness of the winter's day returned to her heart. She fell to her knees and prayed. Prayed for the fleeting feeling of perceived normality to return. But nothing. She must return to her lodge and write. Conjure up the apparition in words. Invent a persona for the forbidden fruit that drew her to its core.

The words flowed. Sentence upon sentence grew to monumental artistic peaks. One-to-another they lay. Great literature spurred on by its mysterious muse. If she could summon up such beauty then maybe, just maybe, she could lay upon paper what she really wanted to convey.

This time she imagined the figure in her head, laying in front of her mind's eye like a warm summer's day. Inviting, still and welcoming. She saw herself step forward and prepare to launch into a warm ocean of unconditional love that the vision had seemed to offer. She stepped off the edge of all she knew and let herself fall. Further and further she fell. But fear wasn't an issue. Acceptance was.

She reached a plateau. She knew she had landed during high-sun on a mid-summer's day. Children were playing, sunflowers gently leaning into the warmth. It was like no emotion she'd experienced before.

A little girl in a white cotton summer dress extended her arm and offered up the reddest rose the authoress had ever seen. She took it and smiled appreciatively at the girl. She lifted the rose and drew in its aroma. Her head span and gently she slipped from the plateau and began to fall once more.

The light faded to black and she sensed the temperature begin to tumble. The rose wilted and died. The season had changed and the now autumnal air took the edge off her happiness.

Her descent slowed once more and gradually all around became still. This time there were no children or sunflowers, but partly barren land and a breeze that cut right through her. This was normally the season she began to become alive. But now she hankered for the warmth radiated from the child's gift of nature. She wanted to fall no-more. Her fatigue gradually brought on sleep.

When she awoke, all was normal. Her bedroom curtains fluttered violently in the ferocity of the icy north winds. The trees that hung above her lodge leaned away from the elements, seemingly trying to escape their roots. She too wanted to be free of the roots that secured her to this sanctuary .. a sanctuary that had become little more than an emotional prison. She'd seen a slit of light and was ready to explore the adventure that lay ahead.

As the authoress stepped out among the villagers she took time to note their features and decipher their expressions. Some looked sad, many lonely and the few, oh how she envied those few, looked contented.

She took time to speak to those who caught her eye. At first just a cursory 'good day.' But as the days began to lengthen so did her confidence. She soon knew many by name. A chosen few were invited back for afternoon tea. All were fascinated in her writing and marvelled when she read aloud her prose.

But, as she began to seek answers as to who the mystery young women had been .. there was but only one answer. She was believed to be the spirit of the seasons. The high priestess of the many elements. They believed, as did she, that the one dark season she had so worshipped had disturbed the spirit, that it had returned to show the unity of all four seasons can come together to mirror a life that is rich, diverse and to be shared. Perhaps contentment is in our own mind's eye after all.